Is everyone posting about Oblivion simply new to it? Seems weird to me that everyone’s so excited about it but it’s probably just because I played it to death the last time it came round.
honestly i’m not surprised. now i look at the old graphics my eyes hurt, even though i remember it looking like the remake, my mind’s eye really had to work overtime on that. makes sense that people were put off by the bright textures with both over and under saturates colours and decided to not play it
Maybe the game is figuring out HOW to send him messages and assistance. Like the princess is trapped in a room full of stuff and she has to figure out that she has to grab a tapestry off the wall and charcoal ash from the fireplace so she can write a big message on the tapestry saying ""I'M IN HERE" and then hang it out the window so the knight can find which room she's in.
And another puzzle could be that she has to figure out how to get a key to the knight who is unable to get past a locked gate in a hallway, so the princess has to find the key, and then she has to figure out that she has to tie it to the waist of a guard who walks around the hallways so that the knight can grab the key off the guard.
Another puzzle could be something with figuring out you have to do something with a rat that scurries between areas.
Another could be doing something with a bird that flies somewhere and does something helpful
Another could be using the toilet tube to drop out a map to the knight waiting below (castle toilets were just a hole in the wall)
Another could be freeing a monster from another cell so the monster will kill all the warriors waiting in the hallway before the knights arrival
Another could be talking to the person who delivers her meals to convince/trick him into doing something outside like drawing an arrow on a hallway wall so the knight knows which way he should go
Etc.
And importantly you can have the story lead to her being in different locations so that the game environment can change to keep it fresh. Like as the knight starts to get close to her location the bad guys will move the princess to a more secure cell (with a wink message to the player audience referencing mario "the princess is in another castle"). And the game can actually start with her trapped in a wing of her home castle with her dad (the king) trying to keep her chaste away from interaction with any men. So she can be trapped in multiple different places throughout the game as the player advances through the game
What kind of gameplay do you have in mind? I’m guessing a puzzle-type game (like a room escape), but you could honestly do a number of different things (tower defense? Platformer?).
I think the answer to your original question largely depends on this. Did you have anything else in mind about the experience?
I have in mind a puzzle game. Not a room escape, but more of a code golf-style game. For example, those programming puzzles that say “write a computer program that adds numbers, but you’re not allowed to use the + sign anywhere in your code”.
Not sure if it would be puzzly enough but if the player can wonder the halls or get escorted through them having part of the knight’s efficiency based on how well you mapped out the area you send as a note plus you could try to find info on guard rotations or over hear about other things that could help the knight
That sounds really cool. If the princess’ telepathy instructions are strangely like code because that is how telepathy works in your setting, and this is a nice frame story for a programming puzzle game… all sorts of whacko fantasy analogues and justifications for why you are not allowed to use the equivalent of the addition command. (Maybe the princess knows through her rich royalty education that the only reason her addition command could be not going through to the knight because his trip took him at a place full of this kind of magic rock with properties that somehow block the wavelength… so she has to work around that. Worldbuilding yay!)
A 3D game where you’re locked inside a tower with tiny windows that allow you to see outside just enough to understand what’s happening out there while the knight navigates the fortress/castle. You have multiple forms of influencing what the knight does and what transpires outside (sending letters and packages with items, crafting said items or potions, using magic, commanding assistance from other loyal servants, distracting enemies, unveiling traps and puzzles to aid in the quest). The place can be a tower with multiple floors and as you progress you might gain access to new floors of tools, while also having maybe “putting out fires” elements such as keeping a dragon asleep with music, filling a moat so evil minions cannot cross, sending equipment and maybe even firing/camping enemies like a sniper but with a crossbow or smthn.
You make them feel trapped by limiting what they can see and do. When things go out of sight or cannot communicate effectively with the knight and limits their actions it then forces succinctness to their effect on their own rescue.
This concept could work great with “combat” in the style of A Plague Tale. If you’re not familiar, the main character is a child. She has a few tools available to manipulate enemies and environmental hazards.
It made me think of indirect games like Black & White, Dungeon Keeper, The Settlers or The Sims. You can give orders but you cannot directly control your characters / units. If you limit the amount of orders, add a delay / the possibility for an interception or introduce areas where your orders can’t reach your hero it could do the trick.
I’m only a hobbyist promammer but have probably read too much about game design. So all this advice is theoretical, I’m just quoting. All I have read always suggest that theme must follow gameplay, not the other way around. Suggestions are always to work on gameloops and gameplay elements first. Also, if a game can’t be physically prototyped, it isn’t ready for development yet. This is an odd suggestion unless you have tons of experience with board games, most games we play can be traced to physical simulation. RPG, FPS, puzzle games, management games, even visual novels can all be physically gamed. So I would suggest to do that first to find out which gameplay elements make sense with your desired themes. Iterate a lot, then it will be more intuitive and obvious what works with the theme and what doesn’t.
The actual gameplay is based on combat, paintball, and other simulations whose rules are replicated. Call of Duty doesn’t emulate real combat, it’s a shooting range circuit skinned like real combat. The gamefying elements are usually card based, or attribute based, which comes from euro board games. There are games whose weapon customizations are based on RPGs or card based deck building.
Yeah, armies have weapons simulator that shoot blanks and lasers to train for real world operations. There’s also BB guns. Most FPS studios send their developers to these places so they get experience and inspiration for weapon models and interesting level designs or combat scenarios.
One of my favorite games to play with my SO is Out of Space the vibe is very similar to Overcooked but it’s procedurally generated and a lot more chilled out, i.e. less chaos.
When doing the quest in town after the first Oblivion gate, the guards didn’t follow me into the building. Had to look up how to finish the quest to continue.
After that, the PoI marker for bringing Martin back to the monastery was at the wrong location (close to the edge of the map & high up in the sky), so quick travel killed us both. Had to look up where the monastery was to continue.
They’re easy to make, actually, all flags and variables, but it seems like a natural fit for what you want to do. The “princess” is usually pretty limited by the trainer, which can be herself or the dragon in this case. Have the dragon own a library and something she can use for training and the game becomes about your princess getting Prison Jacked while finding ways to communicate with her rescue, with events and endings responding to the training choices.
Making the player feel trapped is relatively easy, just place limits on her actions based on the dragon in various ways.
Can’t train in the morning because you have to serve it breakfast. Can’t go riding or outside or whatever until it trusts you or whatever. Can’t research certain topics in the library unless you find a way to sneak in, etc.
Honestly, even if you want more of a 3d exploration game the limitations should probably be the same vibe. Just have the dragon be a constant voice of “No”
How does the telepathy get fueled? Is there something the princess has to do because she keeps running out? Can the knight progress on her own without her?
I’m not even a huge platformer guy, but Rayman Legends is absolute peak and a fantastic, chill co-op game. The music levels in particular - where the already great soundtrack is synced in time to your jumps and hits - are incredibly satisfying and so well made.
I’d also be remiss if I didn’t suggest Blue Prince. It’s not co-op per se as it’d only be one person at a time “driving”, but the game is about puzzle solving so who holds the controller doesn’t really matter. It’s a fantastic game if you enjoy puzzles and escape rooms. My sister isn’t even a gamer at all but I recommended it to her fiancé and they’ve been playing together and even she’s been enjoying it a lot. From my own experience playing it on my own I also think it would be much more fun if playing alongside someone else. I’ve often missed having someone to bounce ideas off when stuck.
On the notion of “one person at a time driving,” I played Outer Wilds with my partner. 10/10. Just make sure that when there is text, both people can read it before you move on.
I’m a fan of taking turns “driving” for slower paced logic or puzzle games. Titles that come to mind:
Myst
Curse of the Golden Idol
Summertime Madness
Chants of Sennar
Superliminal
Viewfinder
Baba is You
I can highly recommend all of these as they almost universally benefit from more minds working on them together. I would say Baba is the only one that gets REALLY challenging, but there are good mind and logic bending puzzles throughout them all!
EDIT: I’ll also add that Myst, Golden Idol, and Chants of Sennar (Summertime Madness maybe a little) all benefit from solid note taking and map making This provides a great job for the “copilot” while the other person is managing the actual input device.
My girlfriend and I do the same but with more simplistic story heavy games. We just finished Slay The Princess and it was an amazing experience like this.
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Aktywne